Riddle in the Rain

Maya pressed her back against the gym wall, heart doing that nervous flutter thing it always did when Jake was within a twenty-foot radius. She'd gone full spy mode tonight – black hoodie, strategic positioning behind the refreshment table, the occasional casual glance over her shoulder like she was just chilling and not absolutely obsessing over whether he'd show up to Homecoming.

Then she saw him. Jake. Standing by that weird papier-mâché sphinx some art club had made for the "Egyptian Mystery" dance theme. It looked ridiculous – all lopsided and spray-painted gold – but Jake was leaning against it like it was the coolest thing ever.

Maya's phone buzzed. Sam: "U gonna talk to him or just lurk in the shadows all night?"

"I'm not lurking," she typed back furiously. "I'm observing."

"That's literally what lurking is, Maya. Go over there."

Easy for Sam to say. Sam hadn't been crushing on Jake since seventh period English when he'd read that poem about lightning storms and made everyone cry. Maya adjusted her hair for the fiftieth time and took a deep breath. This was it. The moment. She was going to walk over there and say something normal and cool and not weird at all.

Except then the sphinx started to tip.

Time slowed down. Maya saw it happening – Jake's phone had gotten tangled in the streamers, and as he stepped away, the whole papier-mâché monstrosity began its slow, inevitable descent toward the floor. Toward Jake.

She moved without thinking. One second she was strategizing conversation openers, the next she was diving across the gym floor, grabbing the sphinx's painted snout and somehow, miraculously, keeping the whole thing from smashing down on him.

They ended up in a heap on the gym floor, surrounded by gold spray paint and streamers, the sphinx somehow balanced between them like the world's most awkward third wheel.

Jake stared at her, eyes wide. "Did you just save my life?"

"Your dignity, maybe," Maya managed, though her face was on fire. "That thing would've crushed you."

Outside, thunder rumbled. The lights flickered like lightning was about to strike.

"You're like, actually incredible," Jake said, and the way he was looking at her made her think maybe, just maybe, Sam had been right about some things.

"Yeah, well," Maya said, "I'm full of surprises."

She didn't mention she'd been watching him for forty-five minutes. Some mysteries were better left unsolved – even if she'd never look at a sphinx the same way again.